“Jaw pain?” Jeff honked derisively. “What’s that?”
Hy ignored his nephew. “Sorry, don’t mean to pry.” He looked past his daughter’s puzzled expression to peer at Klein’s mouth while he explained, “I have a theory that people like yourself, who have important, demanding jobs, who are under great stress, tend to grind their teeth at night.” To illustrate, Hy moved his lower jaw around in an exaggerated way, opening his lips ghoulishly to reveal he was gnashing his molars.
Klein maintained a straight face while he watched this goofy display. Brian saw that the adult’s eyes were twinkling mischievously, but that wasn’t as significant to Brian as his noticing that Klein was tightening his arm around Julie’s waist, pressing her flush to his lap.
Julie opened her mouth as if she were about to shriek, but Klein immediately relaxed his vise. Once she calmed, then he squeezed again, and again let go when she tensed. He repeated this cycle three times. With each encore, she reacted more passively, until it was clear to Brian that she had given up the impulse to object, no longer sure what she could protest.
Brian was astonished. He could see Klein’s maneuvers easily from behind Julie’s father. Hy’s view was also unobstructed, but he wasn’t noticing, he was too busy silently studying Klein’s mouth.
The person who spoke up was Klein. He looked up earnestly at Julie’s father and, after a pensive pause, while squeezing the girl tight to his lap, conceded, “I think you’re right, Hy. I do have jaw pain in the morning.”
JULIE WATCHED HER father’s face loom large as he bent over them while Klein wiggled his finger closer and closer to There. (“Your vagina,” her father had told her to call it—to her mother’s horror. She hated that word. She thought of it as There.) Julie was too startled by all the strange things going on to worry about the right word. For one thing, she didn’t quite recognize her father. Being Hyram Mark’s daughter, and not his dental assistant, she had never witnessed his manner with a new patient whom he wanted to impress, the solemn medical expert concentrating on his work. “May I?” the dentist asked, hands pausing inches away from examining Klein’s jaw.
“Sure.” Klein crossed his forearms completely across Julie’s tummy as if he needed to make room for her father’s fingers. He pulled her even tighter to his waist. She slid her eyes up and to the side to watch her father gently cup each of Klein’s cheeks, index fingers probing at the jaw’s joints. Meanwhile a startling addition joined their threesome. Julie felt Klein’s long hard weenie (that’s what she and her best friend Nancy called penises) against a butt cheek.
She wanted to jump up and run. But how without a big fuss? His hands held her fast. She’d have to yell something about his weenie, which was unthinkable, or pry his hands apart, equally appalling behavior. And her father was right there. He wasn’t objecting. She comforted herself that it would soon be over.
But it continued. Her father probed Klein’s jaw with his fingers spread in a variety of weblike grips. He then asked Klein to open wide and peered at his teeth while Klein’s finger wiggled farther below, past her belly button, making feints There. He tugged the tender skin up, which almost felt like he was touching There. Was he? A radiating tingling made her legs feel unstrung. She couldn’t figure out what was going on exactly because Klein seemed to be absorbing her into his skin. His aftershave filled her nostrils and she was partially deafened by the heavy breaths he took in, then released with a tickling heat across her right ear. (Years later in college, a well-meaning boyfriend licked her earlobe, then blew on it. She screamed. Poor kid was deafened for half an hour.)
“Is that sensitive?” her father asked.
“Yes,” Klein’s answer whooshed into her ear.
“Sore?”
“Uh-huh.” Klein shifted her a little. His hard weenie nestled between her cheeks. Was it really his weenie? It was too hard, too big.
At last her father stood up, stepped back. “Well, I’d have to do a complete examination and a set of x-rays to confirm it, but you’re grinding, Dick. You’re a night grinder.”
BRIAN’S VIEW, MOMENTARILY blocked by Hy’s weird survey of Klein’s mouth, was cleared as the dentist returned to his folding chair. Julie remained captured in Klein’s arms. She stared ahead, her eyes not seeing anything, looking inward at the sensations. Brian knew. Never again in his life would he feel that he so thoroughly inhabited another’s mind—he was living in concert with her soul.
It was just at that moment of utter synchronicity that Julie’s eyes found him. He could almost hear her cry out: What do I do?
Brian had no answer for her. He looked at Klein, whose placid expression appeared to be absorbed by the ongoing consultation with Julie’s father, and heard him declare, “You know, Hy, I don’t really have a dentist I trust.”
JULIE LOOKED AWAY from the solace of Brian’s china blue eyes when Harriet sang out, “Dick, you have to see Hy! He’s a great dentist. You should have told me you were looking for a dentist . . .”
Klein laughed. Julie felt its rumble all along her spine. “Well, no one’s looking for a dentist. No offense, Hy. But I’ve never heard anybody say, ‘Can’t wait to get to the dentist!’ ”
Noah opened his mostly toothless mouth and cackled. Klein couldn’t resist playing to that audience. “Right, Noah? ‘Ever hear anybody say, ‘Oh gee, I can’t wait: cancel my theater tickets I want to go to the dentist!’ ” he said, blowing across Julie’s cheek a hot wind that this time gave off a whiff of the Zolly’s spicy mustard. She tried to wriggle up and away, but his weenie, his hands, his grip, weren’t easing as she had expected they would when her father was done. Meanwhile Noah adored the elaboration of Klein’s joke, laughing so hard sound ceased to come out of his gaping mouth.
Hy suffered being teased with a resigned air. He mumbled, “We’re not too popular,” glumly watching his son’s toothless derision. “But people sure are glad to see us when they get a toothache. Then they cancel their theater tickets, Dick. Then they’re begging to see us!”
The doorbell rang. “And here they are!” Klein adeptly commented. “They’ve all come for root canal.”
His audience was not amused. Noah didn’t grasp the comic significance of root canal, Julie and Brian were preoccupied, and Hy never saw humor in his profession.
Jeff scrambled to his feet, announcing, “I’ll get it.”
“Stay right where you are if you know what’s good for you,” Harriet commanded. “Hy, would you go?”
“Sure,” he agreed, glad to go, flustered by his exchange with Klein. The NBC executive’s sudden addition of mockery to friendliness was not an equation Hy could easily comprehend.
“You know, Richard, you really should see Hy,” Harriet said to Klein while Hy was moving toward the door. “And you should send him some of your show biz friends.”
“You bet,” Klein said. “I’m going to Hy first chance he can see me. And I’ve got plenty of friends who need a good dentist. Especially in TV.” Klein squeezed Julie, confiding in a spiced whisper, “Lots of my friends need your father’s help to make their smiles perfect. Perfect like your smile.” He pecked her on the cheek. His lips parted as they landed, leaving a wet impression, and his hand snaked closer, right to the edge of There, tugging, almost tickling, almost not.
Hy, all suspicion of being ridiculed dispelled, paused at the doorway. “Anytime, Dick. Whatever time works for you. Just tell my secretary when you want to come in and we’ll clear it for you.” The bell rang again. Hy hurried off.
“Would you like more tea, Aunt Harriet?” Julie asked, trying to sit up straight and escape politely. Klein’s arms tightened across her waist, making that impossible. She fell back against him. And he was not forced to let her go because Harriet, reaching for a tissue said, “No thank you, dear,” and blew her nose.
“Can I turn on the TV?” Jeff asked, moving to the console.
“There’s nothing on,” Harriet complained.
“Mets game,” Klein said in Julie’s
ear. At least, with her father gone, the fat fingers settled down, resting on and below her tummy, near There, but no longer reaching for more.
“THAT’S RIGHT!” Jeff exclaimed. “I forgot.” He shimmied on his knees to reach the power dial. Brian felt the vibration of the picture tube awakening through the cabinet. Normally he would have changed position to have a better view, but he was transfixed by the spectacle of Richard Klein with Julie in his lap.
Brian watched her troubled eyes shift to the television. A moment ago, he knew exactly what she was feeling. Now he lost her. She appeared to be thoroughly engaged by a Schaefer beer commercial. She looked uncomfortable, but Klein’s arms weren’t moving. Brian couldn’t know exactly what the fingers of his right hand were up to, but he had enough of an angle to determine that the most they could be doing was touching her tummy. Anyway, even if he touched her . . . what? He had no real understanding of female anatomy, or a vocabulary for it, other than words older boys used and whose correct usage he didn’t know. While the roomful of faces settled into the slack-jawed poses of spectators, besides not knowing what Klein could touch on Julie, he wondered if there was anything wrong about any of it anyway. Maybe everybody knew about being touched down there. Maybe, like some other activities of adults, it was understood and not talked about.
While Brian watched the Mets take the field, everything seemed likely to return to the boring normal of being with adults. But then Sam Rydel’s Converse sneakers appeared beside Brian. “What are we watching?” asked the teenager. “Not the Mets. They never win.” He was carrying a rectangular box, gift-wrapped in blue paper with yellow script that read Happy Birthday!
“Is that for me?” Jeff asked.
JULIE WAS RELIEVED the young prince had returned. Sam Rydel had the fair skin, broad shoulders, and narrow waist of Peter Martins, the best male dancer in the world and the man she hoped to marry someday, although her mother smiled slyly every time she said so. Sam was even more beautiful than Martins, she decided on the spot. With those curls and baby-smooth skin, he looked like the illustration of Prince Charming in her favorite volume of fairy tales, which she sometimes still read when she felt sad.
Aunt Harriet also seemed glad to see this handsome lad. She sat up from her layers of pillows, a hand touching her flattened hair, trying to fluff it. “Sam! You’re back. I thought you had to go somewhere . . .”
“Dick sent me on an important errand.” Sam showed off the birthday gift.
“That’s for later,” Klein said. “After the”—he tightened his arms around Julie’s waist and squeezed three times as he said—“you-know-what.” He pushed all the air from her lungs. While she recovered her breath, his fingers, quiescent for a while, came alive. They spread and reached lower, almost There. Maybe a little There? She arched and managed to slide down some, providing just enough clearance from those fat fingers.
She tried to focus on Prince Charming. Jeff was jumping at him like a puppy, hungry for the wrapped gift, touching, retreating, and touching it again. “It’s a board game,” Jeff guessed. “Right?” He checked with Klein. “Why can’t we play it now?”
“Jeff, cut it out,” Harriet said. “You were so sweet to get it, Samuel. So sweet.”
“Hey.” Klein’s breath tickled her neck. “I paid for it.” Klein patted her tummy, fingers snaking lower, middle tip reaching the edge of There.
Sam winked. “That’s right, Harriet. Dick paid. For a change.”
Jeff grabbed one end of the gift box, couldn’t pull it free from Sam’s hands. “Lemme open it,” he whined. Jeff’s insistence on his desire inspired Julie to try to sit up from the weenie pressing between her butt. If she jerked against and loosened his arms, she could slide down, out and away.
Klein seemed to read her mind: as soon as she tensed to make a move, his arms turned to iron. And his hands got mean: a nail pinched a tender spot just above There. The shock froze her.
But she didn’t cry out. She gave up any attempt to squirm out of his grasp. He had made it clear that she wouldn’t be allowed to move an inch unless she were to thrash and fight hard. She would have to “make a scene,” as her mother used to say, and she wasn’t supposed to make a scene. Noah made scenes, her father made scenes, and both humiliated her mother. Julie got as still as she could. Sure enough, the fingers relaxed and patted her tummy. “Good girl,” Klein whispered, from right inside her ear, it felt like, and so faintly, too faintly for anyone but her to hear.
JEFF’S BACK TO normal, Brian thought, glad to see his friend tugging on his present. Sam didn’t let go. Jeff pulled with all his might, face turning red.
“Jeff!” Harriet scolded.
Sam teased him, lifting the box up and away, but not too far away.
Hy appeared, carrying in another folding chair, setting it down between Harriet’s bed and the closet.
“Open the present! Open the present!” Noah demanded, bouncing on the bed. He didn’t make contact with Harriet, yet she clutched her side and groaned.
While he opened up the chair, Hy scolded, “Stop, Noah. Sit still!”
“I’d better hide this,” Sam said.
“NO!” Noah cried, slamming his hands on the bed. Harriet moaned.
“I’ll put it away,” Hy said, taking the package and leaving. Noah, grief-stricken, buried his head in the covers.
Harriet gestured to the empty folding chairs. “Sit down, Samuel. Tell me all about yourself. You excited about going to college?”
This reminded Brian of another lie he had to keep quiet about—Sam wasn’t seventeen and a high school senior; he was fifteen, a junior. How could he explain knowing that? Worse, if he did let it slip, in retaliation his secret—how It acted—would come out.
Sam sat in Hy’s empty chair. His legs partially obscured Brian’s view of Klein and Julie. Sam looked down at Brian and teased, in the same husky tone Klein used, “Am I in your way?”
“Move here,” Klein told Brian, tapping the empty corner where the drapes gathered when open. “You can see the baseball game better.”
Brian moved on all fours to the indicated spot. Klein wanted him to watch what he was doing to Julie and he wanted to see. Brian leaned one shoulder on the drapes, angling himself to take in both the RCA console and a view of Julie’s legs atop Klein’s lap. With a slight lift and tilt of his head, he could see up her skirt—if her legs parted. She was keeping them flush.
“So tell me, Sam,” Harriet repeated, pausing to release a heavy sigh, “what are you thinking of majoring in?”
“Hoping to go to law school, I guess,” Sam said.
“You’re going to law school?” Hy picked up the conversation as he reentered. He sat in the chair he had placed beside Harriet’s bed, facing Sam and, beyond him, the television, putting his back to Klein and Julie.
Sam laughed. Harriet was scornful. “For God’s sakes, he’s just starting college!”
Hy, bruised from the earlier dentist jokes, was quick to take offense. “I was being polite. He’s obviously too young for law school. Matter of fact, you look too young for college. Did you skip a couple grades? That’s what they’re doing these days, skipping bright kids.”
“He’s seventeen,” Klein snapped. “A very bright seventeen.”
Sam answered respectfully, “I was laughing at myself, Mr. Mark. Law school’s just my dream. I probably won’t have the grades.”
Klein hiked Julie up a little higher on his lap. Her eyes widened. What is he doing with his hand? Brian wondered. Girls only have a hole, Jeff had claimed. Klein said, “Don’t let him talk that way, Hy. Unlike me, you’ve got an advanced degree. Encourage the boy. Tell him he can be anything he wants. Sam’s problem is that he didn’t have the benefit of a great father like you, Hy. He needs a man’s encouragement.”
Openly discussing Sam’s psychological needs was discomforting for Harriet and Hy. She coughed, reached for her tea. Hy smiled warily while stumbling his way through “Uh, yeah . . . Richard’s right, Sam, you put your m
ind to it I’m sure you’d make a fine lawyer.” There was an awkward silence. Brian lost track of the adults for a moment, distracted by the television broadcast of the Mets game when Ed Kranepool hit a home run. “He’s gonna have a great year,” Jeff said to no one, and added that Kranepool had gone to James Monroe High School in the Bronx. Brian had heard him say that at least a million times. “Of course being a lawyer is always a good idea,” Hy tried cautiously. “But you have to have the aptitude for it.”
“Oh, Sam’s got the aptitude,” Klein said, drawing Brian’s gaze back to him and Julie. Where is his hand? He could see the left on top of her skirt, at its waistband. The right was underneath, touching her. That was confirmed by clues from Julie. She wasn’t moving. Her eyes were glazed, focused inward monitoring Klein’s hidden hand. Brian slid down to see what it was up to. “He’s a brilliant student. He’s going to Columbia. I’m sure he’ll graduate Phi Beta and get into any law school he wants—”
“Wow,” Hy said. “Columbia. Why didn’t you say so? Sure, sure, he’ll get into a good law school, maybe even Columbia’s. Theirs is good, very good.”
Brian found an angle that allowed him to see her white panties with little yellow birds and sure enough, just above them, the tips of Klein’s fingers. They weren’t moving. That was good. Brian checked on Julie. She was staring past him. Klein wasn’t. He was looking right at Brian, and once the boy’s eyes came his way, the grown-up winked.
The Wisdom of Perversity Page 20